Monday, April 23, 2012

Making Friends With the Neighbors

Last summer was the first summer spent in our new home on Hazard Ave. If you've been following along for this long, you may remember the cyclone fence eyesore in our backyard.

I thought I'd be able to hide it with some evergreen shrubs, but the Holly I planted last summer didn't seem to take very well...

Ironically, both our parents gave us the same suggestion. Remove the fence, embrace the neighbor's garage, and install some window boxes on those windows. My mom and dad even sent us this inspiration picture of a garage they saw on a home tour (Again. gotta love how the parents scope out home improvement projects for us).

The only problem? We'd need to introduce ourselves to the neighbors, confirm that the fence is indeed ours to remove, AND see if it is okay to plant flowers on their garage.

Chris and I both dreaded this task. We're introverts.

Yesterday morning Chris apparently had looked at that fence one time too many and announced that he was heading to Home Depot for some wire cutters. That fence was coming down! So I hopped in the truck with him and we swung by the neighbor's to confirm.
Turns out that our neighbor is a very sweet old lady who's lived here for over 40 years. She said she's certain that the fence was installed by previous owners of our house. "If I don't know who installed it, then no-one on this street does!" she said.
I asked her about the window boxes and she was excited about the idea. She even acknowledged that the windows of her garage could use replacing and promised to get to it...